Choose loose food
By Laura Stratford
Greater Lincolnshire Food Partnership
Household food waste is a big issue.
We - UK households - throw away 4.7 million tonnes of edible food a year. That represents 18 million tonnes of CO2 and costs us £17bn. The humble spud is the most wasted vegetable - with almost half (46%) of all potatoes bought in the UK ending up in the bin before we get round to using them!
It would be easier for households to reduce waste if we were able to buy our fruit and veg loose and therefore choose the right amount of food for our family or household in the first place. If all apples, bananas and potatoes were sold loose, we could prevent 60,000 tonnes of waste, according to WRAP, which is calling for a consultation on a ban on packaging on 21 uncut fruit and veg items, which, it turns out, most customers would prefer!
Although most food waste (70%) takes place at household level, there are also efforts to reduce waste at the farmgate. A £15m fund from DEFRA is available to help food distribution charities upscale their operations, work with farmers and distribute surplus produce to foodbanks, community kitchens and other social food operations.
“Every year, an estimated 330,000 tonnes of edible food are either wasted or repurposed as animal feed before leaving farm gates. This food should be going onto the nation’s plates, but charities often lack the resources to salvage it and provide it to the most vulnerable.”
It seems like a no-brainer: there’s good food going to waste and people who cannot afford the basics - there should be a win-win response.
But critics from all sides are now questioning whether focussing on surplus food distribution is the best way to solve this dual problem.
The NFU advocates for fairness in the supply chain, including greater flexibility in specifications and better demand forecasting by retailers, so that farm produce is not wasted.
Further along the supply chain, major food businesses are regularly “donating” food that is unfit for consumption or so close to spoilage that it is unfeasible to distribute it in time. Charities and volunteers are left to pick up the pieces while the retailers record a nice round zero when accounting for their waste, and an illusion about donations to good causes.
Research by Feedback found that: “91% of food charity workers surveyed reported being forced to discard food donations from businesses, with 98% saying government should do more to prevent food waste from arising in the first place. From bizarre and unusable donations, to food that is already rotten, food charities are being forced to clean up businesses' waste.”
Crucially, what’s often missed is the question of whether surplus food distribution is helping the most vulnerable people who it is supposed to be reaching. Denise Bentley is CEO and founder of First Love Foundation argues that we need to stop fixating on surplus food redistribution through foodbanks and focus on addressing the root causes.
“When the charity first began, we were operating as a foodbank, but quickly realised the traditional foodbank model did not work to actually tackle crisis or poverty. We realised that distributing food parcels alone was bandaging over the deep–rooted problems of poverty, not solving them.”
The holistic, “no wrong door” approach taken by Lincoln’s Acts Trust (that runs the Community Grocery, Night Light Cafes and Lincoln Foodbanks, and more) is an example of how it is possible to put surplus to good use while looking to the bigger picture, and working for a world where no-one needs a foodbank.
Find out more, and get involved here: https://www.actstrust.org.uk/